How Colin Kaepernick became a player in a Minnesota congressional race

Share this:

People walk by a Nike advertisement featuring Colin Kaepernick on display, Thursday, Sept. 6, 2018, in New York. Nike this week unveiled the deal with the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback, who’s known for starting protests among NFL players over police brutality and racial inequality. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)

Colin Kaepernick can’t get signed to play quarterback in the NFL, but he has become a player in a congressional race in Minnesota.

Last week Donald Trump injected himself into the 1st Congressional District race being contested by GOP candidate Jim Hagedorn and Democrat Jim Feehan (Republican incumbent Tim Walz is vacating the seat to run for governor). Speaking in support of Hagedorn, Trump told the crowd in Rochester, among other things, “We are standing proudly for our national anthem.”

Even those of us who have never taken the time to learn the lyrics.

Trump was tame compared to an attack ad which aimed to join Feehan, an Iraq veteran, at the hip with Kaepernick, who is pursuing a collusion grievance against the NFL.

“Feehan sold out to extremists,” the ad claims in part, “celebrating Colin Kaepernick’s protests of our national anthem. Dan Feehan. Just another liberal sellout.”

Minor point: Kaepernick was protesting social injustice, not the anthem. Nor the military. Nor the flag, mother or Chevy car commercials.

The New York Times reported that the ad features “a doctored image (that) appears to show Mr. Feehan, an Army veteran, saluting Mr. Kaepernick.”

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

The Feehan campaign submitted a statement to CNN’s Reality Check that read in part, “During two tours in Iraq, Dan put his life on the line to defend the freedoms of this country. That includes the freedom of nonviolent protest, (and) the freedom to disagree with that protest.”

It’s true that Feehan and Kaepernick have availed themselves of the Constitution’s guarantee of free speech. It is also true that Hagedorn has done the same. From the New York Times:

“Mr. Hagedorn is making his fourth run for the seat, and was once widely regarded as a weak candidate because of a long record of sexist and insensitive remarks about a number of minority groups — the conservative Washington Examiner called him “the worst Republican candidate in America.”

Meanwhile, Kaepernick hasn’t knelt in public in almost two years and has never issued a disparaging word against the national anthem or any of our country’s venerated symbols. Only a small handful of NFL players are kneeling at this point. The only kneel-down at a 49ers home game so far this season was by a cheerleader.

Not that any of the above is going to change any hearts or minds. A September poll by NBC News and The Wall Street Journal indicated that 72 percent of Democrats believe the silent anthem protest is appropriate, and that 88 percent of Republicans believe it is not.

Gary Peterson is a sports writer for the Bay Area News Group. His prior assignments included 31 years as a sports columnist, serving as a general assignment news reporter, covering courts and writing a metro column before finding his way back to sports.